Marian cross
A cross with a capital M beside it or beneath it, for Mary standing at the foot of the cross. It is best known from the coat of arms of Pope John Paul II.
Meaning
The sign shows Mary at the crucifixion, as in John’s Gospel: “Standing by the Cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary, the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene.” John Paul II wrote that his coat of arms “symbolically illustrates” that passage. He took the arms when he became a bishop in Kraków in 1958, with a capital M for the Virgin Mary, and kept them when he was elected pope. The older source of the sign is the back of the Miraculous Medal, where the M is surmounted by a cross; the Chapel of the Miraculous Medal reads the two signs drawn together as the inseparable bond between Christ and his Mother. It is a Catholic sign.
Origin and history
The M and cross first appear in Catherine Labouré’s visions in Paris in 1830, as the reverse of the Miraculous Medal. The Catholic Encyclopedia’s description of the medal (1911) gives the letter M “surmounted by a cross, with a crossbar beneath it”. Karol Wojtyła was ordained auxiliary bishop of Kraków on 28 September 1958, and among his first acts, Aleteia records, was to choose a coat of arms and a motto: a cross with a capital M in honour of the Virgin Mary, and the words Totus tuus.
Totus tuus
The motto belongs with the M. John Paul II took it from St Louis Marie Grignion de Montfort, and explained it in a letter to the Montfort religious families in 2004: the two words “express total belonging to Jesus through Mary”. Montfort wrote “Tuus totus ego sum, et omnia mea tua sunt”, and translated it himself: “I am all yours, and all that I have is yours, O most loving Jesus, through Mary, your most holy Mother.” In a passage Aleteia quotes, John Paul II said he was drawn to Marian devotion while working in a factory during the Second World War, and that Montfort taught him that true devotion to the Mother of God “is actually Christocentric”.
Read next
- Next in Catholic symbolsMonstranceA vessel of gold or silver with a glass window at its centre, usually ringed with rays like the sun, in which the consecrated host is shown for adoration and carried in procession.
- The same shape in Elder Futhark runesMannazThe Elder Futhark rune for the “m” sound. Its name, *mannaz, meant man, a human being.
See also
Miraculous Medal, Latin cross, Keys of St Peter, Papal tiara, Rosary, Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Sources
- Letter to the Men and Women Religious of the Montfort Families, John Paul II, letter to the Men and Women Religious of the Montfort Families (2004), Holy See (vatican.va), no. 1
- John Paul II’s first action as a new bishop, Aleteia, “John Paul II’s first action as a new bishop” (28 September 2021), Aleteia, Article
- The apparitions and the Miraculous Medal, Chapel of Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal, rue du Bac, Paris (Daughters of Charity), “The apparitions and the Miraculous Medal”, Chapelle Notre-Dame de la Médaille Miraculeuse (official site), The back of the medal
- Miraculous Medal, John Glass, “Miraculous Medal”, The Catholic Encyclopedia, 1911, The Catholic Encyclopedia (1907–1912), via New Advent, Miraculous Medal
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from crosses or letters and numbers.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 9, 2026. How we research
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